


When Goodbye Feels Like The End

by JonsaInTheNorth



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: F/M, Light Angst, season 7
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-11
Updated: 2019-10-11
Packaged: 2020-12-09 08:54:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,245
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20992118
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JonsaInTheNorth/pseuds/JonsaInTheNorth
Summary: When Jon leaves for Dragonstone to treat with the last Targaryen, Sansa is left with only promises and hope for his return.





	When Goodbye Feels Like The End

Sansa finds Jon in his chambers. They are reasonably sized, the heir's rooms that Robb once inhabited. There is a certain kind of cleanliness too them, with his few possessions each in their own place. Even as he prepares to leave, the place has that measured tidiness.

Just as when he left for the wall, Jon packs his own traveling sack. He may be a King now, but part of him will always be the bastard boy who never grew up until he left Winterfell. His traveling gear is heavier than that last journey, but still light: weapons and their cleaning supplies, two thick woolen blankets, an extra cloak, some fresh tunics and pants that Sansa gave him the day he announced he was leaving.

"So, you're really leaving?" She asks, a sense of finality setting in with the words. Jon's gaze is somber when he sets aside the shirt he was fixing with crisp, militarily precise folds. Her throat tightens. "You go tomorrow."

"Aye, we go." He rises from his place on the great bed in the center of the room, and tentatively approaches Sansa.

Even after all the time they have been together, the weeks they spent on the road planning their fight with Ramsay and the daily meetings here, running Winterfell - even after all this time, he still finds her impossible to read. Maybe it is the fault of all her lessons from Cersei and Lord Baelish, the lessons of the court and pretending to be a Vale lord's bastard daughter, seen but never speaking. Or maybe Sansa is just impossible for anyone to understand, too far in the darkness to be saved.

"I'll miss you Sansa, but I know you're capable of everything Winterfell needs, and more." Jon's eyes are soft and warm as he looks at her. He surprises her by holding out his hand to her.

She is always the one to initiate contact between them, to touch him at all, except for that one moment on the battlements of Winterfell, a time when Winter came and life felt like a dream… Jon took her in his hands then, startled her and made her smile, but only for a moment and then he was gone.

Sansa thinks he is afraid of breaking her, hurting her or reminding her of Ramsay and Joffrey. He knows her pain, but he does not want to let her live it. Just like Father, Jon is still trying to protect her no matter how much she tells him that protection is impossible. But Jon could never hurt her, and Sansa trusts him.

Sansa takes his hand.

They stay like that for a moment as quiet night winds blowing outside the keep. Hand in hand they stand and wait for whatever the other one might say.

"This is goodbye, then?" Sansa says, looking up from their hands to his face, so suddenly close to her own. If she reached out with her free hand, she could hold his cheek. She is sure her face reddens at the thought, and then it must redden more as she wonders why she is thinking these kinds of thoughts at all.

Jon squeezes her hand tightly. The touch, so gentle yet so intimate, warms her wholly. "I'll be back, with dragon glass from Dragonstone. I promise."

But I don't want dragonglass, Sansa wants to scream. I just want you.

Instead, she asks, "But when will that be?"

Her eyes must show her pain, her brow furrowing and her chin hardening to keep the quiver she feels at bay, because Jon drops her hand to hold her face. Jon steps into her, their bodies close enough to touch. He leans his forehead against hers, their breath intermingling between them. It is cold enough, even in the castle, that she can see as Jon breathes in and out, slow movements in his chest and light releases of air with each new breath.

"This goodbye is... hard, Sansa."

"Goodbye is always hard." Sansa scoffs, thinking of the last time she saw her father, the real goodbye she never had with her Mother, Rickon, Robb. She does not want him to go away without a proper farewell, because goodbye means going away and going away is as good as being gone. "Why should this be any different?"

Jon takes her hand again and brings it to his chest. Sansa bites her lip hesitantly. Through layers of clothing and his own thick skin, she can feel his heart beating rapidly. "It's not just hard."

Sansa sighs. I must be as strong as my lady mother was.

Robb was Catelyn's burden as a king. For whatever reason, the gods took away Joffrey and gave her Jon. He is her king, the only king she wants in this world. Her mother told her she would be a queen someday, when she was young and dreamed of knights and springs that last a thousand years. Being his lady is a different kind of queen, just as Jon is a different kind of King.

"I know, this is difficult."

She flattens her hand against his chest, not to push Jon away but to feel him more softly. "I know this is hard. We have done so much and there is more left to do."

Sansa swallows her tears and her fears. She looks across into Jon's eyes, and it is like her father is staring back at her, the only truly good man she's ever known back in the flesh. The memory makes her say something stupid.

"Promise me, Jon. Promise you'll come back."

"Sansa, I-"

"Promise me." Her voice hardens, and she nearly chokes. Jon nods, his face a mix of emotions of all kinds.

"I promise."

Sansa reaches out and grabs his forearm. "Yes?"

"I promise I'll come back. With dragons, and dragon glass and - " Jon stiffens as she squeezes, hard.

"None of that matters unless you come back, too. And not like Father and Robb came back, but live and well and here for true." Sansa's words are emphatic, and Jon seems dizzied by them. She retreats a little, drops all contact and goes back a step.

"I swear it."

"Good." She withdraws within herself, knowing not to trust her heart for any reason. "I'll see you off tomorrow, Jon."

Sansa turns, but Jon's gentle hand against her back stops her. She turns to meet him, to take in the dark hair pulled back into its sleek bun, and the soulful eyes just ready to pull all your truths away from you. This is her Jon, and she does not know what Jon will be like when he comes back.

"Goodbye, Sansa." Jon sweeps her into a bear hug the likes of which she's never felt. His arms are tense and protective walls around her, and she holds onto him like a hook inside a fish. This is her Jon, hers and only hers until Arya and Bran are back because he is theirs in a way he will never belong to the rest of the North. She nuzzles her face into his neck. When she met him at the wall, Jon smelled liked the forest of Winterfell, dark green and woodsy, but now his smell is home, the fur of a wolf and the warmth that comes from being safe.

She doesn't know how to feel safe without him.

Sansa presses a soft kiss to Jon's scratchy cheek. "Farewell, Jon. Please, please come home."

**Author's Note:**

> Let me know what you think and come fangirl about GOT and ASOIAF with me on [tumblr](http://www.starksinthenorth.tumblr.com/).


End file.
